A Snapshot of My Childhood

*We lived out in the countryside when I was young. My mother and I were single - we lived alone in a trailer, across the field a "country block" away from my grandparents. I remember one night (it was dark out) when I must've been, oh, I don't know, 4 or 5 years old? when a tornado came through.

We had enough warning of the weather to make it over to my grandparents' house. We were all in the basement (unfinished, stone walls, clammy.... three deep freezes, shelves made of boards filled to bending with canned goods.... spiderwebs in the beams above our heads) when I realized that I had forgotten my beloved teddy bear at home. I was apparently unconsolable - I don't remember that.

I do remember that my uncle.... a young man at the time, maybe 20 years old? got into his car and drove from my grandparents' house to our trailer. He only made it part of the way, our road had downed electric lines lying across the gravel. He parked his car and walked the rest of the way, rescued my teddy bear, walked back to his car, and returned to the house.

The next day, we went back home. Our trailer was still where it was supposed to do, and in perfect shape. But our garage was completely gone - as if it had never existed.

Love. The things that people will do in the name of love.